Did Mozart abuse drugs?

[Pastorali]

How I have seen, some of you are reading Mozart biographies, so then, the answer will be easy for you.

Did Mozart abuse drugs?

From time to time, I do hear this and I would like to know how it really was. What sort of drugs, if really true? Alcohol, marihuana, opium? How was the relationship to such drugs at this time in Vienna?

What I know here from Switzerland: In earlier times, people had a relaxed relation to it. Marihuana plants growed everywere and were known as "Plants for poor people" (Arme Leute Kraut) It was legal possible to buy hashish in the pharmacy. That totaly changed with the american's worldwide fight against drugs, last century...

[spaceray]

I've just read an interesting book titled Mozart's Last Year by H C Robbins Landon,the author does not mention whether Mozart was strung out on any drugs.He did overwork to the point of exhaustion several times throughout his life.

But it was quite common to dose oneself with all manner of medicants ,heaven only knows what these might had done to him.

There was a rumour that Mozart might have been poisoned by enemies offended by the secrets of Freemasonry exposed in The Magic Flute.It made for a fun Hollywood movie but has never been thought to be true by reputable scholars.

Mozart died (along with many others that year)in an epidemic of streptococcal infection.

[Gurn Blanston]

Well, having read at least half a dozen Mozart books in the last 3 months, some of them with an iconoclastic attitude too, I have yet to see any mention of this. I think he was keen on medicaments, having inherited this pharmaceutical bent from his father, but drugs in the sense that we use today, which is to say "recreational", I don't think so.


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Regards,
Gurn
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That's my opinion, I may be wrong.
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[v russo]

Originally posted by Gurn Blanston:
Well, having read at least half a dozen Mozart books in the last 3 months, some of them with an iconoclastic attitude too, I have yet to see any mention of this. I think he was keen on medicaments, having inherited this pharmaceutical bent from his father, but drugs in the sense that we use today, which is to say "recreational", I don't think so.

I agree with Gurn (hi Gurn...) but I do get the impression that Mozart liked to do everything to excess (music-women-drink-play etc, etc...)


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v russo

[This message has been edited by v russo (edited January 31, 2004).]

[v russo]

Was there not a rumor that Mozart was poisoned by an angry neighbor for having an affair with his wife? I read this (years ago)in a book about Mozart and Constanze. This may explain the quick and discreet burial.

?

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v russo

[Opus131]

Originally posted by v russo:

I agree with Gurn (hi Gurn...) but I do get the impression that Mozart liked to do everything to excess (music-women-drink-play etc, etc...)

Did he ?!?

That's the character deptiched in the play (and movie) Amadeus, but since i never read any real biography yet (i'm a brand new Mozartian) i'm now wondering if that was even remotely correct.


[This message has been edited by Opus131 (edited January 31, 2004).]

[Amalie]

I wonder what the current state of research is on the cause/s of Mozart's death.
I find it odd that his body was never autopsied and that his remains were lost, seven years later when his grave was dug up for reuse. Didn't Constanza keep a lock of his hair?
One theory is that he died from Trichinosis, through eating parasite-infested pork.
Another theory, is that he over medicated himself on mercury for the treatment of syphilis.
It would be good to know up to date thinking on this.



[This message has been edited by Amalie (edited February 01, 2004).]

[Steppenwolf]

Originally posted by Amalie:

I wonder what the current state of research is on the cause/s of Mozart's death.

I recently read a biography which postulated the current medical theory as to the cause of his death. I cannot remember the name of the condition off-hand (I will look it up) but it involved severe damage caused to his kidneys due to several extremely serious infections which he had suffered throughout his life. He was throughout is life prone to catching whatever illness was passing around, and the collective damage caused to his body contributed to a morbid condition.

[Steppenwolf]

Originally posted by Pastorali:
Did Mozart abuse drugs?
...

There is no evidence whatsoever that Mozart did 'abuse' drugs. Of course, in those days of primitive medicine and quack-doctors he may have taken all sorts of toxic things on prescription, but there is no evidence at all that he took anything 'recreationally'. And I find it difficult to imagine that his creativity, and the clear-minded clarity of his compositions could have been sustained throughout a drug habit.

[Steppenwolf]

[quote]Originally posted by v russo:

I agree with Gurn (hi Gurn...) but I do get the impression that Mozart liked to do everything to excess (music-women-drink-play etc, etc...)

Although Mozart's well known child-like personality gave him a youthful exuberance, he was not a hedonist.

You say he was excessive in "Music-women-drink-play"

Well music CERTAINTLY he did to excess (thank goodness for the World!)

Play - quite possibly, he was a very playful character.

Women? - not at all! Just before he married Contanza he wrote a letter to his father Leopold assuring him that he had never slept with a woman before and that he was marrying as a virgin (and that that was half the reason he was in such a hurry to get married!), and there is no evidence that this was untruthful. Nor is there any credible evidence that he had mistresses or affairs after the marraige.

And as for drink - he was no teetoller. He enjoyed a beer or glass of brandy with friends or while playing billiards. But he was certainly not a drunkard either. The depiction of an apparent drink problem in the film Amadeus, towards the end of his life, is unfounded.



[This message has been edited by Steppenwolf (edited February 01, 2004).]

[Peter]

Originally posted by v russo:
Was there not a rumor that Mozart was poisoned by an angry neighbor for having an affair with his wife? I read this (years ago)in a book about Mozart and Constanze. This may explain the quick and discreet burial.

?

This concerns the pianist Magdalena Hofdemel whose husband violently attacked her the day after Mozart's death then committed suicide - her face was permanently scarred. She was 5 months pregnant at the time and rumours were rife of an affair with Mozart - she later stayed with the Czernys and requested to hear Beethoven playing his music - Beethoven according to Czerny refused saying 'Hofdemel? isn't that the woman who had the affair with Mozart?' He did change his mind at a later date and played for her. This story was told by Czerny to Otto Jahn in 1852.


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'Man know thyself'

[v russo]

read the above paragraph by Peter Steppenwolf


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v russo

[Gurn Blanston]

So much interest in this topic, I love it!
Peter is quite correct about the neighbor, so let us dismiss that one right away. Absolutely no evidence. He was a Masonic lodge brother of M also, and he was once considered a possible pawn of the Masons for killing m because he gave away so many of their secret rituals in "The Magic Flute", but it is all so much tripe.
I disremember now who said that he dies from kidney failure after a long bout of fever, but this is true, and his body retained huge amounts of water because of the kidney issue and was already decomposing at the time of death, so an autopsy was right out, also a quick burial was in order.
Everything to excess?!? No, that's me, not Mozart. The portrayal of him in Amadeus would be grounds for a lawsuit if he wasn't deceased. Beyond the fact that enjoyed social intercourse, there is absolutely no documentary evidence whatsoever that he was intemperate.
And he wasn't poisoned by Salieri, either. Oh, his career was, but his body wasn't.


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Regards,
Gurn
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That's my opinion, I may be wrong.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Peter]

Originally posted by Steppenwolf:
Women? - not at all! Nor is there any credible evidence that he had mistresses or affairs after the marraige.

On August 19th 1827 Karl Friedrich Zelter wrote to Goethe "We remember the circumstances of Mozart's death only too well. As a result of such good training, production went so smoothly that he had time for a hundred things, time which he spent with women; in consequence it did not do him any good."

The Hofdemel episode I refereed to came up again in a play set to music by Franz von Suppe in 1874 called 'Wolfgang und Constanze'. One line from that is 'Does one not know that Mozart had an affair with a woman whose husband cut his own throat?'

Whatever the truth behind these rumours they certainly persisted for many years after Mozart's death in Vienna, and Beethoven was aware of them.

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'Man know thyself'

[This message has been edited by Peter (edited February 01, 2004).]

[Pastorali]

Thanks to all for giving input!